The Blue Jackets spent the previous two days expressing their utter confidence in goaltender Curtis McElhinney, their backup-turned-starter now that Sergei Bobrovsky is mending a groin strain.

But it was important for the Blue Jackets to get McElhinney off to a start like last night — with a crisp, clean performance and a 4-0 win over the Minnesota Wild before snow-shrunk crowd of 11,319 at Nationwide Arena. McElhinney made 20 saves for his first shutout in nearly three seasons. He rubbed his chin a few seconds after the game when asked to pinpoint his best save.

“It was a great performance in front of me by these guys,” he said. “I pretty much saw every shot. The shots that I didn’t see ended up hitting bodies in front. When there were rebounds, I think everybody cleared them out.

“It was a very well-played game on our part. Hopefully, it’s the start of something good.”

The Blue Jackets have won two straight games for the first time in six weeks, and they have won two straight by shutout for the first time in three seasons. On Tuesday, they beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 1-0 when Bobrovsky and McElhinney combined on the shutout.

Cam Atkinson, Nick Foligno, Boone Jenner and R.J. Umberger scored for the Blue Jackets, and Ryan Johansen had two assists.

The Wild, which beat Chicago 4-3 at home on Thursday, looked lethargic. The Jackets had a 41-20 shot advantage, including 32-13 in the final two periods.

“We know we can win games with Curtis,” said Umberger, who played in his 400th NHL game and had a goal and an assist. “The guy has been put in all kinds of situations for us this season, and all he has done is play great. We wanted to play this kind of game no matter who was in net, but it’s good to see him get a win right away.

“We know if we do our job in front, he’s going to do his job back there.”

The Blue Jackets seemed to break the Wild’s will in the second period. Atkinson scored off a wrist shot from atop the right circle at 1:17 to make it 1-0. At 5:40, Foligno made it 2-0 on his second whack at a rebound in front of goaltender Niklas Backstrom.

The Wild had 73 seconds of a 5-on-3 power play later in the period, but the Blue Jackets snuffed it out.

By the time Jenner and Umberger scored in the third, the focus turned to getting McElhinney the shutout.

“It’s a nice bonus, for sure,” Foligno said. “I think this was one of our better performances of the season. We took advantage of a tired club, maybe, but it’s been awhile since we did that.

“We were a tough team to play against.”

The Blue Jackets hadn’t won back-to-back games since Oct. 25, a span of 19 games.

“We’re getting closer (to a complete game),” coach Todd Richards said. “It was good, but there are still some areas we can be better at. I don’t want to take anything away from our win — 4-0 against a good team is something to be proud of — but we can still be better and do things harder and faster.”

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